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CNN Sunday Morning

Interview With Chester Gillis

Aired June 09, 2002 - 09:17   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: The Catholic priest sex abuse scandal will take center stage this week, as nearly 300 U.S. bishops head to Dallas for a major meeting. They hope to come up with a policy toward priests accused of sexual misconduct. Chester Gillis is a professor of theology at Georgetown University. He joins us live from Hartford, Connecticut. Chester, great to see you.

CHESTER GILLIS, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY: Good morning, Kyra, how are you?

PHILLIPS: Very good. This draft, let's talk about this draft report and you don't think it's enough, do you?

GILLIS: No, I don't. I think it's a very good draft and it certainly goes much farther than the Rome document, which laid down the principles for this matter, but the specifics and the implementation and the accountability are all within this document, and I think as far as it goes, it's good, but the issue that it omits is the question of one strike you're out policy and whether or not that's retroactive.

I think regrettably, the church may have to cast a very wide net and some priests who have been serving for even 15 or 20 years after some criminal act, will probably have to be removed from ministry, in order to reassure American Catholics and, in general, the American public that the church is dealing with this in a forthright manner and that the church is not above the law, that it doesn't have a separate set of principles or legal norms, which are in addition to or aside from the American norm.

PHILLIPS: And when we talk about this, you thinking it's not enough, many people think this is not enough. I'm just going to read from the report here that it recommends defrocking priests who abuse minors in the future, as well as those who have molested more than one child previously, yet so many of the numbers show that Americans want zero tolerance.

Now, from a Biblical perspective, it's not very forgiving when you have zero tolerance, but then again you were pointing out, it's a difference between rehabilitation, forgiveness. Let's bring in sort of the religious thinking here.

GILLIS: Well, theologically certainly there's a chance for redemption. God is the most forgiving God and the church should mirror that; however, when you have criminal activity and when there is a question of whether or not someone is rehabilitated and that's a psychological or psychiatric judgment that differs from theological norms of compassion or forgiveness.

I think certainly priests who have been involved in this activity should be forgiven. They should consider themselves redeemed in God's grace; however, there is still a legal accountability and there still is a question of whether or not this is a psychological disability, which can not be overcome.

PHILLIPS: And now that all these lawsuits are following the scandal, individuals are now going to speak, I guess one-on-one with the bishops versus the organization SNAP (ph), this organization of sex abuse victims. How is this going to affect things, this change? Is this good? Is this bad? Can it still be effective?

GILLIS: Well, I think it's important that the bishops face their accusers and those who have been wronged by the clergy. It's a most important step. It probably should have happened much earlier. I mean obviously the first persons to be attended to here are the victims and their families.

The recent developments of bringing this into the case of litigation between SNAP and the bishops has made that much more complex because if there's litigation pending, then the bishops are somewhat constrained in what they might be able to say by their legal counsel, and the legal counsel for the other side is going to be very aggressive about trying to trip them up.

So it makes it much more complicated and I think that's very unfortunate. There could have been a clear airing of differences and a clear pattern of forgiveness and a confrontation, which would have been very healing. Now I think that's very unlikely.

PHILLIPS: Talking about these policy proposals, there's so much conversation going on about how to deal with the priests, but how to deal with the victims is a huge part of the healing. What do you expect when it comes down to policy proposals? How will the victims be incorporated here in how they will be treated or apologized to?

GILLIS: Well, first of all, they were apologized to in the draft document. I'm sure -- and that's the first part of the document. It's the most important part in my view.

PHILLIPS: But there's a difference between that versus meeting with them and having one-on-one...

GILLIS: True. I'm sorry.

PHILLIPS: No. No. No. Go ahead.

GILLIS: In some cases, bishops have met with them. Cardinal Keeler, for example in Baltimore, met with a victim at the request of the victim, and I think bishops will probably do this in their own diocese where they know there's a case and where the victim is willing to meet with the bishop and willing to receive the forgiveness of the church and the assistance of the church to the degree that it can in the sense of counseling, rehabilitation. But the relationship to the church is fractured and there's great fissures for these people and many of them probably will be alienated from the church for the rest of their lives. That's the tragedy of all of this.

PHILLIPS: Chester Gillis, Georgetown University, we always appreciate you being with us. Thanks, Chester.

GILLIS: My pleasure, Kyra, have a good day.

PHILLIPS: You too.

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